


Family is more than blood

by ninedragons



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:21:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26535037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninedragons/pseuds/ninedragons
Summary: Original characters from our Star Wars tabletop RPG having a bit of forced downtime and serious conversations.Also, they have baklava on Tatooine. This is now canon. I have spoken.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	Family is more than blood

_“Wake up, Cat’ika! We need to go!” Her mother shaking her awake. The little girl rubbed her eyes, protesting weakly, still half asleep. Then she noticed the noise from the hallway.  
Blaster fire.  
Cat looked at her mother for some form of reassurance, but there was none. Maya Rook did not look into her daughter’s face, just silently dressed her in a hurry, then took a favourite toy, pressed it in the little one’s hands and off they were into the hallway.  
The sounds of battle grew louder. They rounded a corner and there was Aunt Ursa, pushing a gravsled. Wounded Mandalorians were on it and an open crate, in which Maya now set her daughter. Cat saw, little Sabine and baby Tris were already in it, both looking terrified.  
“Ursa, take the children to the shuttle, I’ll hold them off as long as I can!” Maya Rook bent down and kissed her daughter’s forehead. “You go with Auntie Ursa! Be brave, verd'ika! You’re my little warrior and a Mandalorian and I’m so proud of you!”  
Before Cat could say anything, her mother put her helmet on and rushed away, down the hallway, where now a tide of armoured warriors was spilling through the door. Mandalorians and the white armours of Stormtroopers. The last thing Cat saw through a veil of tears, as the sled with her and the others went in the opposite direction was her mother running towards the fighting, where in the thick of it appeared a figure clad in black, flashing a red lightsaber… _

Abruptly Cat jerked awake and for a few moments, did not know where she was. It was pitch black and her neck hurt from falling asleep in a chair. Then it came back to her.  
Bestine Hospital, Tatooine!  
She listened in the darkness for the reassuring sound of Iantus’ breathing. They had taken him out of the bacta tank this morning; the prosthetic arm was currently being prepared in a lab and would be ready in a day or two, depending on how fast the organic components were growing. The hospital was rather proficient in the treatment of lost limbs - something that apparently happened a lot on Tatooine.  
They had been a bit confused about the ‘cultural requirements’ though.

Luckily medical droids did not count as ‘persons’ in the sense of The Way. Not for the first time Cat wished that things were not so damn complicated. The Mandalorians of old weren’t.  
But the Mandalorians of old had not been hunted almost to extinction either.  
And so Cat had explained to some baffled doctors, as patiently as she could under the circumstances, that this patient needed either to be treated with their helmet in place or, if that wasn’t possible, by non-sentients only. There had been a feeble attempt at questioning the logic of such requirements, which was quickly cut off by the idea of having to deal with a seriously pissed off Mandalorian, who was obviously already tense, because their spouse just lost an arm and barely made it to the hospital at all.

The doctors and medical personnel coped; just as they did with Cat breathing down their necks for days now. Iantus would probably find hilarious, that she had given his last name as ‘Rook’ and declared herself his spouse on the record. Well. She hoped he would find it hilarious.

A sound from the bed interrupted her thoughts. “Cyar’ika.” Barely a whisper.  
She found his hand in the darkness. “You’re awake! How do you feel?”  
“Like rancor chow!” A dry, raspy cough. “Ow!”  
“Accurate.” Cat leaned her face against his hand.It was warm and the skin was a little rough. She knew every scar and every callus and she tried very hard not to think of his other hand, the one that had ended up on the bottom of a rancor pit. “You broke a few ribs too. They’re mostly healed, but the doctors said, it’ll still be painful.”  
“K’atini! It’s only pain!” He still sounded weaker than one of her Loth-kittens, but twice as scratchy. “Where is my helmet?”  
“Next to you on the bed stand.”Cat smiled. “Don’t worry, it’s all good, The Way has been observed, I took care of it.”  
Iantus breathed a sigh of relief. “You… you saved my life! You took out the rancor all by yourself!”  
“Well, it was either that or join you at the bottom of the food chain!”  
“You won’t let me live this one down, will you?”  
“Probably not.”  
“Do I at least get a kiss?” 

Cat leaned in and found his lips, trying to be as gentle as possible as not to hurt him, but Iantus was having none of it. His remaining arm went around her and he hugged her as tightly as he could. For a long time, they both clung together like they were drowning and their kiss left both of them a little breathless.

“I thought I’d lost you!” she murmured.  
“I love you!”  
“I know.”

***

Medical personnel in general do not approve of visitors falling asleep on patient’s beds, but Cat was at this point so used to the daily routine at the hospital that she managed to get up before anyone could complain. Iantus had insisted on putting his helmet back on; Cat knew, if it had been an option, he would have requested the rest of his armour too. Not wearing it made him feel vulnerable; in combination with the pain that made him positively cranky. Not to mention the loss of his arm. Even though a replacement would be just as good and indistinguishable from his own, the shock went deep.

Cat remembered that terrible moment when the rancor had bit down on his shoulder, the horrible _crunching_ sound as the arm came loose and her thought of _this can’t be happening!_ before her blaster fire made the beast turn around and charge her. Thank the stars for thermal detonators!  
It was another memory she could do without. 

This morning though, Iantus, who wasn’t good at dealing with negative emotions at the best of times, was back to his less charming self in conversation with the medical droid, which at some point left exasperated to search for a doctor. Cat took the opportunity to duck out of the room herself and find breakfast. Iantus would come to terms with the situation in his own time; he had a lot more healing to do than just his ribs or his arm.

The hospital had a cafeteria where she got herself some caf and a flaky pastry dripping with sweet syrup. Then she gave Ryn a call.

“Hi Sweetie, everything ok?” Ryn sounded chirpy as ever. “How is your worse half?”  
Guessing from the holo, she was flying the Tempest. Bean was leaning in cheerfully from the copilot seat, waving.  
“Finally awake.” Cat said, licking syrup off her fingers. “Though judging from his temper, I’m not sure if we accidentally left Sniper at the pit and took the rancor instead.”  
“Sounds like him alright!” Ryn nodded. “Glad he’s better though. You can let him know we dug through the pit with a sensor and found his pauldron. Maybe it cheers him up.”  
Given that a Mando wouldn’t waste a single gram of beskar, it actually might, Cat thought. “What are you guys doing?”  
“Flying supply runs for the new Hutt boss!” Ryn grinned. “And by supply runs I mean…”  
“... smuggling!” Cat finished the sentence. “Do be careful, love!”  
“I got to fly the Tempest!” Bean informed her loudly. “And Wren is teaching me how to repair things!”  
“You need to show me all the things you learned when we’re back in a couple of days!” Cat smiled. “How is Saskja doing?”  
“Oh, she’s being Saskja, basically” Ryn shrugged.” Doing lots of networking and stuff. She had a holo conference with the rest of the Hutt cartel, who were not happy at first and who now love her. Also she’s changing her outfits even more often, if that’s possible!”  
“I miss you guys! I’ll see you in a couple of days, hopefully!”  
“Miss you too sweetie! Tell your pet rancor to get well soon!”

When Cat returned to the hospital room, Iantus had somehow gotten hold of a datapad with his medical record.  
“Iantus Rook? Really?”  
“Well, I thought it was better than having on record that the famous bounty hunter Sniper had been chomped on by an overgrown pet.” Cat shrugged. “It would completely destroy your reputation as galactic mystery.”  
“Fair.” Neither the helmet nor his voice gave anything away. Cat sat down on the edge of the bed.  
“How are you feeling?”  
“Like I could use a good scrap! I hate sitting around like this.” His voice had an annoyed growl to it. “But the doctors said they can fit the arm tomorrow and I should be good to go in a few days.” 

They sat in silence, hands entwined, for a few minutes. Finally Cat said “I have something I wanted to show you.”  
She reached into her bag and pulled out the item she had been carrying around for a few weeks now, always waiting for the right moment. It was a small mythosaur skull, the symbol of the Mandalorians, carved from wood with a beautiful grain, polished so smooth it had a silky feel to it.

Iantus took it from her and admired it. “That’s veshok wood!” She could hear the wonder in his voice. “It must be really old.”  
“Made by a great-, great-, great-, great-Grandfather of mine, back in the days when there were still veshok trees on Mandalore.” Cat smiled. “My mother gave it to me when I was little. I want you to have it.”

He seemed to think for a moment, then very firmly pressed the wooden symbol back into her hand.  
“I… can’t….”  
He took a deep breath, then said a single word. “Saxon.”  
“Excuse me?”  
“Saxon. My name. The name of my clan. I was one of them until I left.”  
Cat inhaled sharply, as a lot of pieces suddenly fell into place. He didn’t look at her. “So now you understand why I can’t?”  
She shook her head. “I understand why you are… you! And now I want you to have this more than ever!”  
“But… why?” Whatever he had expected, her reaction had not been part of it.

Cat turned the little wooden symbol in her hands as she continued. “Catalyna Rook, nicknamed Cat. That was the name of my famous ancestor. First Rook to be made a Mandalorian. Champion of the Great Hunt. Adopted by Mandalore himself. A legend. And they named me after her!”  
She smiled, a sad little smile.  
“Then my mother sends me off with the words I am her pride, her little warrior, runs off and gets herself killed. And my entire life I feel like I can never live up to that. I was running away from my name, running away from being a Mandalorian, I thought I wasn’t worthy, I thought I had lost myself.”

She looked at him, at the helmet, searching where somewhere behind that visor his eyes were, that she had never seen in all the time they had been together.

“Then I met you. And you turned my entire life around and gave me back what I thought I had lost. That was you. Not some clan name, not any history you were a part of, it was just you as you are. And I think it is about time we leave the past where it belongs and start living for a future.”

She offered him the mythosaur skull on her open hand.

Iantus drew a breath. “You’re sure about this?”  
“Absolutely.”  
“You’re mad!”  
“Mostly about you.”  
“Catalyna?”  
“We are in a hospital and I can inflict a lot of pain, so don’t call me that. Ever.”  
“Cat?”  
“Yes?”  
“Help me take that helmet off!”


End file.
